Such storage units are used in particular for transporting perishable goods by air, sea, rail, or road. Such storage units are equipped with electrically-powered equipment which makes it possible, inter alia, to maintain a controlled temperature inside the units, thereby guaranteeing that the transported goods remain unspoilt.
When transporting such units by rail, one solution consists in equipping the storage units with electricity generator sets having diesel engines. Unfortunately, such engines give off a large amount of pollution to the ambient air, and they are noisy. That solution also suffers from the disadvantage inherent to the presence of a large number of separate items of equipment, giving rise to extra costs related in particular to managing such electricity generator sets, and giving rise to problems of taking up extra space and of constituting an extra load, thereby reducing the storage unit payload. Finally, such electricity generator sets can run only for a restricted time before they need refueling, and they require periodic maintenance.
Document FR-A-2 696 558 discloses stand-alone apparatus for self-service delivery of electricity in the field of road transport. However, that document only makes reference to powering a single item of electrically-powered equipment when the vehicle is parked. It does not provide a solution to the problem of electrically powering a train set in running order.